Assimilation
by Caelta
Summary: Dana is his last and only real connection to a life he thought he knew.


A/N: This is just a little epiphany I had one day after playing the video game, so it's not all that action-packed. Reviews are welcome. :) Cheers!

Disclaimer: All recognizable material belongs to Activison.

* * *

It is a sickening feeling.

I am not as dissimilar as one might think from the towering and almighty Zeus for which I was named: never was I human, never will I age, and never will I perish. With one fell swoop, I can devastate an infantry and spread death like the plague; separate from humanity, I stand above them, plummeting across the lighted expanse of the resilient city, past neon greens, exotic blues, and hot, fire-tainted oranges, never touching down for longer than a feather-footed second before launching back into the illuminated skies of Manhattan. Wherever I go, I spread terror and disease like the scarlet, miasmic screen hanging densely on infected sky like a death sentence.

Pulling molecules and genes like strings in a puppet-show, I am capable of manipulating my very form and shape into things even the best imagination might not dare to encroach upon. In this way, I may well be the most talented actor in the entirety of the globe by having surpassed physical limitations to such an extreme that, as even the worst actor may succumb to, I have reached a level where I may fool even myself.

Living with what I am, I have come to resent the man given the name Alex Mercer. Up until recently, I believed vigorously that this was me; now, the truth is a surprisingly hollow fact. I am but an empty shell, an ugly monster projecting an image that is merely that. My entire life is a ruse; I am no more Doctor Alex Mercer than I am any of the other convincing memories of my consumed victims, pulsing livid throughout my modeled veins and echoing like the distant conscience of ghosts into my identity.

Who am I? I am everyone, and I am no one. I am not human, but altogether something more. I have not experienced tragedy, love, or even life except vicariously through the haunting fragments of what remains of who I have killed. My ability allows me to see as far back as the dim reaches of childhoods belonging to those I have absorbed; I know everything they knew, and feel everything they felt. What is left, that is my own?

Even more than resent, I envy this man who, in a sense, gave birth to me. This, I know, is the single most defining facet belonging to what I may call myself. As something apart from human, I am not certain that I can feel. Except the fleeting emotions engendered by my victims' memoirs, I can account for no sentiment that is purely of my own creation. I cannot feel the plight of loneliness, for I have never known more than distrust and a nagging sense of obligation.

In a very technical way, I do not simply obscure myself with the guise of someone else, for I myself do not have an identifiable self-image. Those that I transform into, on a biological level, I _become_. My sequence of nucleic acids is identical to theirs, their memories are my memories, and for all intents and purposes, my physiological structure is no different from any other homosapien. The faint film of infection, the capability of changing this at random, of knowing this, and of being utterly _more_ than just that one is what separates me eternally from humanity.

Pain is universal. Even the dumbest animal struggles and cries out at the scalding nudge of the white-hot brand, and the cockroach runs instinctively at the impending shadow of hurt. I know with certainty that pain is something I do feel, and perhaps the thing I know best. No matter what form I take, the neural impulses respond all in a similar fashion. If I am cut, my cells will cringe and I will bleed. If I am tossed through a layer of brick and mortar wall, I will be dazed and bruised.

Similarly, if I am faced with a life of useless indifference, the envy is also a kind of pain. I must admit, it is hard to deny oneself once one has had a frugal taste of splendor. For a very fleeting portion of my existence, I was mentally and physically a human being. Perhaps it was not so in reality, but what is reality but perception?

For all of a few days, I believed myself a man; I felt, I sensed, and I breathed all with a vigor that escapes me now. Maybe it is impossible to go back, it being equally impossible to erase my knowledge of the truth. With every shred of my being, whatever that is, I wish that I could forget.

I have not attempted to change my dominant persona from that of Mercer, perhaps because I feel more intimate the connection to his character, perhaps because he is my last and most prominent way of extending myself closer to something human, or perhaps because I simply do not have a more appealing option.

Balanced on the very edge of a structure reaching 120 stories into the heavens, I feel the crisp curve of the city air, hear the faint roar of traffic and the wild battle-cries of car horns, and observe the heavy mélange of assorted lives as if I was truly Zeus on the precipice of Olympus. This is the good side of town.

Up here, eye to eye with the drifting wisps of clouds, I have no audience—I feel less like a staged performance, a pathological accident, and more as if I might belong among the pell-mell below. From afar, our differences are less prominent than juxtaposed up-close; I can almost make myself believe that I am a part of it, and that there is a reason for all of this.

Somewhere close-by, a crow calls out its harsh greeting, reminding me that death and infection are not too far away.

Hardly a flutter, a mere ripple in the muffled silence, and I am gone from my perch with none but the crow as a witness that I had ever been there at all. The wind picks up to a consistent siren in my ears, whipping my hooded jacket like a cape at my back, as I dive towards the approaching ground at a streaming speed worthy of even the best pilot. In a major feat of aerodynamics, I pull up from the sharp, leaden momentum and glide across to the ledge of the next piece of architecture: a rather drab and unimpressive office building.

If there is one good thing that came from my devastating abilities, one release, it is the sensation of little flights from building to building, across the tallest heights of the metropolis.

Where I landed, I settle down to look up at the blue-grey of the smog-impeded sky, far-off tinged with the red of gory affliction. Some time later, I take the short drop down to the squalid street, keeping subtly to the sidewalk, and traverse the length of the route until I come upon something singularly odd.

"Alex!" That voice.

Footsteps behind me. I turn.

I am caught in the weight of an embrace, a familiar feminine figure curved to my own less jaunty frame, and I can barely see past a truss of mottled hair. Again, she says my name, quieter than before. She steps back, and the smile she wears is genuine; it exudes a depthless thanks, and I scarcely wonder why.

Dana.

I feel myself return the gesture, a half-hearted twitch at the corners of my lips. It feels a bit unnatural, but she doesn't mind. She's just glad that I'm here, and I wonder if I can say the same.

This is not my sister. This is the sister of Alex Mercer. This is a stranger.

As much as I tell myself this, as frustrating as it is that I _have_ to tell myself, it doesn't quite get rid of the small flicker of relief in me. I may never know if it was a product of Mercer inside of me or whether it was my own, but the disarming look of the woman before me breaks my stolid barriers. This is my learning tool, my paved road into the society I watch from afar. Because it is evident she and Mercer had not been in very frequent or friendly communication, I am left to conclude that she has been endeared to me because of who I am, whoever I am, and not because of who I—Mercer—was supposed to be to her.

Here, at last, was the vindication of a being who cared for me beyond social niceties and duty. Here, I think, is someone I might trust.

"Come to lunch with me," Dana finalized. "And let's start over."


End file.
